Counterpointe

by Ann Warner

  “Are you sorry you married me, Clare?”

  “What a thing to ask, Rob.”

  He waited, but she didn’t add to her response. An answer in itself that hurt more than a physical beating.

  “You know, we haven’t done something, just the two of us, for a while. What would you like to do? If you could do anything you wanted.”

  She bent her head, but not before he’d seen the expression on her face. Okay, dammit. Besides dance. When was she finally going to accept the ballet was part of her past, not her future? Her future was with him.

  “We could visit the arboretum. The lilacs are starting to bloom.”

  She shook her head with a sharp movement without speaking.

  “Please talk to me, Clare. It’s...I’m lonely. I miss you. I’ll do whatever it takes. Go to the shelter. Get another dog. See a therapist.”

  She shook her head without looking at him.

  “Dammit, Clare.” He threw his napkin on the table and stood, shaking.

  Her head jerked and her eyes widened in alarm.

  “I need...you need...to tell me what I can do to help you.” Didn’t she see he was hurting, too? She wasn’t the only one who’d lost something essential. He struggled every day with the fear he’d lost her.

  “I can’t, Rob.”

  “Please, Clare. Please try.”

  Blinking, she raised her face to his, her eyes wet. Abruptly he sat and reached out to touch her. “Tell me. How can I help.”

  She shook her head. “I...don’t think there’s anything you can do.” She bent over sobbing.

  He lifted her into his arms, holding her as he had after she lost the baby and again the morning Mona died.

  For a while things were better between them. Until he noticed how much the effort was costing her.

  His professional life, with his promotion to full professor and another grant funded, was on a roll. But his personal life was a shambles. No longer could he convince himself everything would be okay if he just gave Clare enough time.

  He’d suspected he was taking a chance, asking her to marry him before she’d come to terms with her injury. But he’d wanted to be the prince riding in on the white horse, making everything right. And at first, he thought he’d succeeded, but now it was clear that even in the beginning there had been cracks—hairline fissures that over the months lengthened and deepened until nothing whole and complete was left.

  He loved her so much, but he no longer believed she loved him at all.

  “I thought we might go to the Cape today.”

  For once, Rob’s suggestion appealed to Clare, perhaps because with the onset of spring, the days were longer. “How about I pack a picnic?”

  “If it’s not too much trouble.”

  “No trouble at all.” She felt so guilty sometimes. She’d done nothing but let him down, let herself down. It was all she could muster the energy for, to acknowledge it. Doing something about it was still beyond her.

  Rob drove by the turnoff to Falmouth, and a flash of disappointment darkened the day. So they weren’t going sailing, after all. She waited with little enthusiasm to see where they were going as Rob followed the south coast road for several miles before turning into a narrow lane. At the end, he stopped the car.

  “Are we there yet?” she teased him.

  “Not quite.” He came around to help her out of the car. Expression solemn, he took her by the hand and led her along a path through the scrub and stunted trees until they came out on the beach.

  The ocean lay glittering before them. Shivering, she stared at that wind-whipped expanse. Rob tugged on her hand, turning her to face a small house crouched on the edge of the sand far enough from the water for safety in a storm. It was one story, except for a tower, reminiscent of a lighthouse, attached to one corner.

  “What do you think?” he asked.

  “About?”

  “About living in that cottage for the summer?”

  Dread clenched her stomach. He couldn’t have. Please, let it be just an idea he had. A possibility she could modify, change. This wasn’t any sort of solution. Didn’t he see that? Isolating her out here with an empty sea.

  She took a breath and willed herself to smile at him. “I don’t know what to say.”

  “I know you love the Cape.”

  True, but she loved the part with quiet waters and harbors filled with boats and houses snugged up against each other. Not this part with its deserted beaches, icy winds, and restless surf.

  “Come see.”

  He unlocked the door, and she stepped inside to find the cottage artfully furnished. The colors used for both walls and furniture were peaches and creams with touches of green. Perfect for a beach house.

  “It...takes my breath away.” Literally. She struggled to swallow.

  “I knew you’d love it as soon as I saw it.” He pulled her into a tight hug, obviously not hearing the panic underlying her words. “The pièce de resistance is this way.” He grabbed her hand and led her through the bedroom, mostly decorated in cool greens, to a small alcove containing a spiral staircase.

  A year ago she would have been unable to navigate those stairs, but her leg was now improved enough that she managed without difficulty. At the top, she stepped onto the plush green carpeting of a hexagonal room with six window seats. Each held plump cushions in a rainbow of colors.

  She could easily love this room, if the view were something other than wind-swept beach and empty ocean.

  “You stay here,” Rob said. “Get acquainted with the house. I’ll get the picnic.”

  Waiting for him to return, she wanted to weep. For him, for herself, for the pain she’d already caused and would continue to cause. He’d added a chilled bottle of champagne to the supplies she’d packed. She watched his hands tear the foil from the top of the bottle and begin to untwist the wires holding in the cork.

  “No.” The word pushed out, past the tightness in her throat and the ache in her heart.

  He paused, his eyebrows raised in question.

  “I’m so sorry, Rob. I can’t live here.” She tried to find additional words to soften it, but they eluded her. Like wild birds scattered at a cry of alarm.

  He set the bottle back in the ice. “It isn’t working, is it?” His voice sounded raw and uneven. He cleared his throat and, for an instant, his eyes blazed with pain. Then he turned his head away. “You always seem happier when we come to the Cape. When I found this cottage, this room...you like to read. I thought...” He shook his head. “Stupid of me.”

  There were words to ease his pain, but they would be a lie.

  He stood. “I need a few minutes before we go back.” He lifted an envelope from among the things he’d brought from the car.

  Clare sat unmoving, watching as his figure receded until between them lay only barren stretches of dunes being shaped and scoured by the cold wind.

  After the inspiration for spending the summer at the Cape occurred to Rob, he’d spent weeks looking for the right place. He’d been certain Clare would love the cottage, especially the tower room with its wild, free view. But the whole plan turned out to be a desperate and ultimately futile attempt to reweave the connection they had somehow let unravel.

  He left her in the tower room and slogged through loose sand until he reached the firmly packed area along the water. There he stopped to remove his shoes and socks before continuing barefoot along the strand.

  Head down, he put one foot in front of the other until the cottage was a smudge of gray in the distance.

  This is the end. The end. The end. The chant once started, kept pace. The sudden frigid touch of a wave altered that desolate rhythm, but for only an instant.

  Still, that endless dirge was better than the reality it represented. Clare, her face strained, but her “no” unwavering.

  It was past time he faced facts. Nothing he could say or do would make her happy. If anything, the evidence pointed to him as the problem, not the solution. Clare had been
unambiguous for months, so why had he, a scientist for chrissakes, been so obstinate about acknowledging what was before his eyes?

  Love’s dream.

  Now he was awake.

  He stopped abruptly and turned toward the water. Waves breaking far out from the shore slid in to foam at his feet. In spite of it being nearly June, the wind was fierce and cold, and his toes cramped in the chill surf. Tears piled up behind his eyes, making his head ache, then slipped unheeded, down his cheeks. He took the note for Clare he’d written with such hope, and tore it into tiny pieces, tossing them into the wind. The bits of paper swirled around him, dipping and swooping, and then they were gone.

  He turned and walked slowly back to the woman he loved but was going to set free.

  Chapter Twelve

  Grand pas de deux - Variation for the danseuse

  Dance for two - Variation for the female dancer

  Rob gave her only glimpses of his pain after she rejected the idea of spending the summer at the Cape, but he returned from his walk along the beach a different man. On the drive back to Boston, he spoke only to ask if she wanted to stop for lunch. She said she didn’t.

  Back at the apartment, he carried the picnic up, leaving her to follow. “I’m going to the university. I’ll be late so don’t worry about making dinner for me.”

  He left and Clare stood in the living room, her arms wrapped around herself, racked with cold. Staring at a future as bleak as the view from the beach house’s tower.

  Clare learned about Hope House from an article in the Boston Globe. An ex-football player named Calvin Becker had bought an old building and was turning it into a place to teach life skills to men who no longer had dreams. According to the reporter, Becker believed lost dreams were best dealt with by practical means. It snagged her interest, the first thing to do that in months.

  Still she hesitated when she saw where Hope House was located—in an inner-city neighborhood likely surrounded by dirt, disorder, and derelict buildings. A place neither pleasant nor altogether safe...and dammit, she was doing it again. Undermining herself. Talking herself out of taking a step...any step.

  Whatever happened to the woman who’d leaped at the chance to fly to Madrid to dance in Balanchine’s Diamonds with less than four days’ notice and a couple of rushed rehearsals? That woman didn’t back away from challenges.

  Except, that woman had no idea life could narrow down to such, such... Blinking rapidly, she looked out the window at the bright light of a perfect spring day that mocked her dark thoughts.

  Rob had already left for work and he wouldn’t be home until late. As usual. Any more, he spent only minimal time in the apartment, and during that time he avoided her. She didn’t blame him. If she had a choice, she’d avoid herself as well.

  She reread the article, feeling a tiny flutter of interest. Hope House needed volunteers and an address and phone number were listed. But if she called, she’d find a way to talk herself out of getting involved. Better to go, immediately, before she lost her momentum.

  She grabbed a light jacket and her wallet. A short cab ride later, the driver stopped at a three-story brick row house that had once been, if not elegant, at least neat and trim. Now it had the slumped appearance of an old woman with a dowager’s hump. The iron fence edging the sparse yard was rusted and dull, and tired junipers bracketed the concrete stoop. The only bright spot—the front door—was freshly painted a wildly inappropriate buttercup yellow.

  Uneasy, Clare double-checked the newspaper to verify this was the address for Hope House before she dismissed the cab and walked up to that resplendent door.

  It was opened by a thin elderly black man. “No need to knock, missy. Just walk yourself in.”

  “I’m here to see Calvin Becker?”

  “Upstairs. Second room on your left.” The man stood aside, and feeling as nervous as if she were about to step onto a stage underrehearsed, she climbed the stairs and entered a large room apparently formed by knocking out several walls. A huge black man sorted through a drawer in a kitchen area.

  “Calvin Becker?”

  “Yep.” He had a short, neat beard sprinkled with gray and a matching Afro. Both looked springy and soft. When he finally looked up, if he was surprised to find a white woman a third his size in his doorway, he hid it well.

  “I’m here to see if I can help.” She managed to make the words sound definite even though her insides wobbled like a top at the end of its spin.

  “Doing what?” Becker’s expression was not particularly friendly. That might have been intimidating if he hadn’t reminded her of Wilson Taylor, the rehearsal pianist for Danse Classique. Wilson, a big brown teddy bear of a man, looked just as forbidding when he was first introduced.

  “I saw the article in the newspaper. It said you needed help, and do you always look gift horses in the mouth?”

  “But you ain’t no horse.” He narrowed his eyes and she lifted her chin and met his gaze.

  “You expecting to be paid?” he asked.

  “I expect rewards, but none that will deplete your bank account.”

  He shook his head. “Deplete my bank account. Oh my, oh my. You talk just like Appleseed.”

  “Appleseed?”

  “Friend of mine. Always sounds like he’s quoting one of them books he totes around.” Becker continued to give her an assessing look, but she detected a glint of humor in his eyes.

  “I don’t mean to talk like a book. I’d just like to do something to help.” If he didn’t loosen up soon, she’d take it as a sign this project wasn’t the right one for her, even though she badly needed something to get up for in the morning. “And no, Mr. Becker. I don’t expect you to pay me.”

  “You can call me Beck. What’s your name?”

  “Clare.”

  “You got another name?”

  “Chapin. Clare Chapin.”

  “Maybe we can figure something out, Clare-with-another-name. I teach good eating habits, bit of basic cooking. Other volunteers teach computers, taxes, budgets.” He rubbed his cheek with a thumb. “Lavinia now, she been saying we need someone to brush the men up on their reading, writing. If she says okay, we’re good.”

  “When can I meet Lavinia?”

  “She right behind you.”

  Clare turned to find an ample black woman with intricately braided hair and an expression of obvious delight standing in the doorway.

  “Well, now. I hear that right, beautiful. The Father sent you to help us?”

  Beautiful? The Father?

  Lavinia clasped her hands together. “Praise the Lord.”

  At least that explained who the Father was. “It’s good to meet you, Lavinia.”

  The other woman took Clare’s hand between both of hers. “Now nobody calls me that but my momma when she’s upset with me and Beck when he’s trying to impress somebody. Vinnie’ll do fine.”

  “Don’t get your hopes up, my sister. She ain’t met the men yet. Might change her mind when she do.”

  Vinnie released Clare’s hand and threw up her arms at Beck. “Father don’t send us nobody going to quit easy.”

  Clare tried to decide if Vinnie’s certainty was good news or bad news.

  “You come with me, beautiful,” Vinnie said, cutting off both debate and the possibility of escape. “Let’s get you signed up and work us out a schedule.”

  When Vinnie took her on a tour of Hope House, Clare discovered Appleseed was Beck’s nickname for the resident custodian and handyman, John Apple. They encountered Apple, a thirtyish white man with a ponytail and a guarded expression, in the break room reading a book.

  After that brief introduction, Clare didn’t speak to John until a few days later, when she was having lunch in the break room while he worked on a leaky faucet.

  “Isn’t your husband concerned about you coming here?” he asked.

  Clare rubbed her thumb against her wedding ring. “He doesn’t mind.” The truth as far as it went. She wondered what Rob would think
if she told him.

  “Most husbands wouldn’t want you to come here unescorted.”

  “It’s not far and it’s good exercise.” She unwrapped her sandwich, hoping to close out this particular subject.

  John twisted around, a shocked expression on his face. “You walk here?”

  “Easier than fighting Boston traffic and trying to find a parking place.” True, she wouldn’t walk in the area after dark, but during the day it was no worse than the neighborhood where the ballet center was located.